Betsy Ross I’m not

I tend to do most of the home repair and improvements around here. Mainly ’cause I’m the one with the most time, but also because I like to do it. I’m wicked with a power drill, I have a Philips head screwdriver in my desk drawer, I wield a mean caulk gun. But I hate to sew. HATE.IT. I’d rather perform oral surgery on myself without novocaine. How ’bout this: I’d rather be pregnant and give birth again without drugs than have to sew something. That’s how much I despise sewing. Putting buttons back on I can handle, and hand sewing I can grit my teeth and get through it. But if I have to haul the sewing machine out of the basement, there’d better be a stiff drink on the other side of the project. I’m a miserable seamstress. It’s not for lack of education. I took sewing through middle school (and have the handmade stuffed animals to prove it; the nasty apron I made with the meandering seams is loong gone) and my mom is one hell of a seamstress. She made both of my prom dresses, one of my bridesmaids’ dresses, makes stuff for herself all the time, and is basically awesome. I suck. Here is proof of my suckage. Several years ago I needed to make a simple muslin cover for a christening gown. We had just gone to Ireland and I bought a linen christening gown for the children I knew we’d have someday. Yes, I bought it childless and pre-pregnancy. I wanted an Irish linen gown and knew I’d not make it back to Ireland before kids, but I digress. I needed to make a simple muslin cover for the gown, just to keep the dust off. I got out the sewing machine, managed to get it threaded, and spent the next hour and a half trying to figure out why the hell it wasn’t working. After an hour and a half I realized the needle was bent. This was obviously before kids; there’s no way I’d spend an hour and a half like that now. So I toddled off to the closest sewing machine repair shop (seriously, it was about a mile away), handed the owner the bent needle and begged for a replacement. Took me ten minutes to make the cover once I got the needle.

So, last night, I had to haul the sewing machine up from the basement to make a lap pad for A. A lap pad is a weighted pillow-like thing to put on his lap, to keep him sitting and frankly, calm. I designed it to look like a giant envelope, with a flap on top, and five thin sections to fill with bags of sand. First off, I screwed up the measurements and had to re-cut the fabric, thank God I had enough. You’d think I’d remember “Measure twice, Cut once”. Pinned it up, went to get the machine ready. Freakin’ machine. Couldn’t get the bobbin to work, damn thing kept stalling on me, I had to use the instruction book to actually thread the thing…and it was Friday night. Of all things, sewing on a Friday night! Took me 3 freakin’ hours to make this simple item. Not a happy camper. Was there a drink at the other side of the project? No. How wrong is that? But we have some liquor-filled chocolates, and that helped.